Stacking the Shelves: Fracture Me Recklessly With A Fiery Poison Song

Stacking the Shelves is a weekly meme hosted by Tynga's Reviews to showcase all the books we got in the past week. Those can be bought, won, gifted, for review, borrowed, print or ebooks... no matter, just share what you got :)


Hey guys! I didn't do a StS last week, so this week there are a couple more books than usual :) I hope everyone had a great Christmas/solstice/whatever other holiday you celebrate and that you could spend some quality time with your family and relax! I got some cool stuff myself - my sister gave me this awesome cup,

and a set of Game of Thrones poker cards! They have the major characters on them as well as the mottoes of the great families and the design and paper are just beautiful :D
But here's to the books:

Won / Gifted

Reckless, by Cornelia Funke
Immenblatt und erster Schnee, poems by Georg Gisi & illustrated by Marthe Keller-Kiefer, 1955

Thanks so much to Caro from The Book Rogue for the copy of Reckless! It was an awesome Christmas surprise :) The book of poems I got from my uncle, who also gave me two other books, one from 1843 and the other from 1873. I'll show you those another time.

Bought in print

Shadowfever, by Karen Marie Moning

The Fiery Heart, by Richelle Mead

Under the Never Sky, by Veronica Rossi

I've already read Shadowfever (borrowed from a friend) but now the right edition was on sale so I had to complete my collection. I can't wait to read The Fiery Heart and finally give Under the Never Sky a try!


Bought as ebooks

Poison Princess, by Kresley Cole

A Song For Julia, by Charles Sheehan-Miles

Bitter Sweet Love, by Jennifer L. Armentrout

Pentimento, by Cameron Jace

Fracture Me, by Tahereh Mafi

Poison Princess almost didn't happen for me. I wasn't impressed by the kindle excerpt, but I gave the 17 chapter preview a try and ended up falling for the story! It was definitely worth it in the end. A Song For Julia was free, and I've wanted it ever since reading an excerpt a long time ago. JLA + gargoyles was a no-brainer, Fracture Me I would've gotten sooner or later anyway, and Pentimento was free, too.

So yeah. I've got a lot of great reading ahead ;) What do you think of my haul? And what did you get for Christmas and for your shelves?

Top Ten Tuesday: books I was 'forced' to read

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly feature hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. Every week they post a new topic that the participants come up with a top ten list for.


This week's topic: books we were forced to read, be it required reading, the urging of friends, fellow bloggers... this can be both good or bad, and I have a few of each.



Thomas Hardy - Tess of the D'Urbervilles / Jude the Obscure
I study English literature, and these were parts of two different courses that I took. Let's just say that the books are not badly written at all and I understand Hardy's significance for the English canon, but they were not my thing at all. They were so depressing and unfair and I wanted to either shake the characters or know them over the head.

Jennifer L. Armentrout - Obsidian
Honestly? I was not initially interested. It's about aliens, and that's not usually my thing. But everyone loved these books and talked about how much fun they were... and about Daemon. I'm so glad I finally gave in and read them (not read Origin yet)! I laughed so many times while reading Obsidian! I love good banter XD

Rick Yancey - The 5th Wave
Remember what I said about aliens? Again, everyone went nuts about this book. I still wasn't really planning to read it, at least not in the near future. But for some reason I entered a giveaway... and won. Damn would I have missed out! There was a ruthlessness to the writing that I really enjoyed, and it was frighteningly realistic.

James Joyce - Ulysses
Everyone's strangely afraid of this... novel? As an English major, I thought that I should read it at some point. And it had better be in class, when we can discuss what it all means and how to best approach it. There's a class with Fritz Senn in Zurich at the James Joyce foundation, so every Wednesday at 8:00am I found myself in an old house with creaking floorboards and leaden windows, scooped up in a room with shelf upon shelf of books about Joyce and his works, being taught by this 85-year-old brilliant man who pretty much devoted his life to reading and writing and teaching about Joyce. It felt like a place left over from another era, where studying meant acquiring knowledge for knowledge's sake, not to collect credits for graduation. I loved it.

Gayle Forman - If I Stay
I know, right? Despite all the reviews, the girl-in-a-coma-thinking-about-her-life thing somehow put me off. I had a completely false concept of the theme and structure of this book. I bought it at the second hand store on a whim (and because I felt like I sort of had to) and could only bring myself to read it after being reduced to a sobbing mess by Just One Day. I just wanted more of Forman's writing, and bought Where She Went the morning after finishing If I Stay. Then I read it all the same day.

Deborah Harkness - A Discovery of Witches
I friend bugged me for a year until I finally read it, and I'm so glad I did! I loved the academic Oxford setting and the complex lore! It's really different from your usual paranormal read.

Veronica Roth - Divergent
Yeah, I know. The US covers never really pulled me in (I know everyone else loves them, but I prefer the UK ones) and I used to be really wary of dystopians. I've since warmed up to them. But it took A LOT of urging by blogger friends and the books showing up in I don't know how my TTT lists for me to finally read it, and devour it. I was... ignited by it. Needless to say, I have Allegiant on preorder.

Jane Austen - Emma / Persuasion
I had to read both of these for university. I have a really strange relationship to Austen's books. I like what she does and her use of structural irony. But she always has at least one character that is soooo annoying/mean/manipulative, and her heroines tend to be the 'strong through endurance' type. I usually have to metaphorically kick myself to make through the first half of the book before I start getting into it.

So, that's ten. I'm not sure they'd all count as 'forced' but I was reluctant about them or had no choice in the matter. I realized that I often sabotage myself when it comes to books I think I might love (like Divergent) and put off reading them for some reason, like I'm afraid to like them. Which sounds crazy. Anyway, what do you think of my list? And what kind of books made it onto yours?

Stacking the Shelves: Crowns, Stray Souls, and a Terrible Beauty

Stacking the Shelves is a weekly meme hosted by Tynga's Reviews to showcase all the books we got in the past week. Those can be bought, won, gifted, for review, borrowed, print or ebooks... no matter, just share what you got :)

Whenever I'm in London, I buy quite a few books! This time it wasn't as many as I'd anticipated, but hey - at least I could fit them into the suitcase with all the other stuff without driving myself crazy and having a panic attack ;)

So here's what I bought in several stores across London:

Shadows on the Moon, by Zoë Marriott
The Night Itself, by Zoë Marriott
Stray Souls, by Kate Griffin
Throne of Glass, by Sarah J. Maas
Crown of Midnight (ARC), by Sarah J. Maas
Sentimental Jewellery, by Ann Luise Luthi
A Great and Terrible Beauty, by Libba Bray
Blackbirds, by Chuck Wendig

I'm really excited about all of them! I love Kare Griffin's Urban Magic books! I've wanted to read Libba Bray for more than a year, Blackbirds had me intrigued since I first saw that cover, and Zoë Marriott is an author I've had a manga discussion on twitter with but I'd never read her books ^^'' So it was about time. The book about sentimental jewellery I got in Highgate Cemetery. Victorian mourning customs are an interest of mine, as is post mortem photography.
But you guys, the Sarah J. Maas books were the greatest surprise!! I was in a used book store on Charing Cross Road and I was just about to leave empty handed when I glimpsed the white spine of ToG on a shelf!! It looks unread, no spine broken, no bent edges!! I already counted myself super-lucky and was just turning to the register when a shelf further down I saw another white spine. With red writing. And I just about died when I saw that it was an unread ARC of Crown of Midnight!!! And both books were so cheap even though they look new!! I've already read Crown of Midnight (of course :P ) and you'll get my review on Monday.


Won:

Marco's Story, by Page Morgan

I won it in a giveaway over at Publishing Crawl :) Thanks again!

For blog tour:

Steel Lily, by Megan Curd
Disconnect, by Imran Siddiq

Particularly excited about Steel Lily!


Ebooks:


Neverfall, by Brodi Ashton
Shadows, by Jennifer L. Armentrout
The Boys of Summer, by C.J. Duggan
Lost, by Nadia Simonenko
Real Ugly, by C.M. Stunich
Dream Dark, by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl


So that's it! Took forever to link them all up o.O I'm really happy with my haul though! Have you read any of them? Because I don't know where to start ^^' Also, please leave a link to your own haul so I can check it out :)

Book Trailer Reveal: Opal, by Jennifer L. Armentrout

I just finished Onyx on Monday, so I'm really happy to be part of the book trailer reveal for Opal, the next book in Jennifer L. Armentrout's Lux series! The cover is just gorgeous and I'm really glad release day isn't that far off anymore! The trailer recaps the first two books at the beginning before making me really curious about Opal. I hope you'll enjoy it as much as I did :)




Opal will be available in print and ebook version on December 18, 2012.

Goodreads description:
No one is like Daemon Black.

When he set out to prove his feelings for me, he wasn’t fooling around. Doubting him isn’t something I’ll do again, and now that we’ve made it through the rough patches, well... There’s a lot of spontaneous combustion going on.

But even he can’t protect his family from the danger of trying to free those they love.

After everything, I’m no longer the same Katy. I’m different... And I’m not sure what that will mean in the end. When each step we take in discovering the truth puts us in the path of the secret organization responsible for torturing and testing hybrids, the more I realize there is no end to what I’m capable of. The death of someone close still lingers, help comes from the most unlikely source, and friends will become the deadliest of enemies, but we won’t turn back. Even if the outcome will shatter our worlds forever.

Together we’re stronger... and they know it.


Goodreads

Amazon
Barnes and Noble

Check out Jennifer L. Armentrout on the following sites:

Facebook
Twitter
Official Website

Stacking the Shelves & blogging update

Stacking the Shelves is a weekly meme hosted by Tynga's Reviews to showcase books we got during the past week, no matter how or what format they came in.


I bought:

Onyx, by Jennifer L. Armentrout
The Iron Queen (Iron Fey #3), by Julie Kagawa

The little key necklace you can see in the upper part of the picture is a very pretty piece of jewelry I won in a giveaway by A.G. Howard, the author of Splintered. Can't wait to finally read her book in January!


Furthermore, I got a free downlaod access to Ali Cross' first two books in the Desolation series because I voted for the title of the third book and was among the majority who chose 'Destined'.

Here are the first two books, click the covers to get to goodreads:




I also got my first review request! Check it out below:

 
She’s a halfbreed in hiding.

Rainbird never belonged. To one race, she’s chattel. To the other, she’s an abomination that should never have existed.

She lives on the sunway.

High above the ground, Rainbird is safe, as long as she does her job, keeps her head down, and never ever draws attention to herself.

But one act of sabotage is about to change everything.
For Rainbird. And for her world.





I love the cover! Her dancer's pose, high up in the night sky. Also, someone approached me to review a book! Not the other way around! I know many bloggers get dozens of review requests every week or so but this is a first for me, and the email exchange was a very positive one. I recently heard about all the terrible ways some bloggers get requested to review books (e.g. on twitter, facebook, generalized emails without sufficient info etc) and I'm glad it wasn't this way! I'm excited to read the book once I'm done with one or two NetGalley titles. It sounds very promising and like it could be a 'me' book.


Blogging update:
This is a confession of shame. Yes, I haven't been very active. I think this marks the second week of almost meme-only posts and no reviews, and I don't like it at all. I want to have actual content on the blog. But I've just been feeling very very drained - I do just enough to keep up with universtiy coursework. I've had a lot going on, and I just had a kind of review writing block. I also haven't written on my NaNo novel since Sunday. It all just feels wrong and I'm very discontent with how things are going. I've been pretty much off twitter, too. I've had little energy and motivation to write anything, but I think I'm past the worst part. I hope I can finally write my review for The Shadow Society tomorrow. It's not that I was in a reading slump (I don't think that has ever happened to me) but I just couldn't get my thoughts straight and into review mode. I really hope I can turn this around in the coming week!
If any of you have tips on this problem that they can share, ways to get motivated again... bring them on! I'd really appreciate it!

Otherwise, let me know what you think of my haul & link up your own in the comments :)

Stacking the Shelves

Stacking the Shelves is a weekly feature by Tynga's reviews to show off the books and other book-related goodies we got that week. This can be books we bought, got for review, won, etc. No matter whether they are print or ebooks.

After last week's epic haul, I don't have quite as much to report. I put myself on a book buying ban. Still, there are some things I had already ordered that are still trickling in:

Yup, my copy of Obsidian has finally arrived! Now I can see what all the fuss is about ;)
Also, I'm taking a colloquium on James Joyce's Ulysses for my studies this semester.  It's taught at the James Joyce Foundation here in Zurich by Fritz Senn, one of the best Joyce scholars there are, and I'm honored to have the chance to learn from him.
And that mug you see there at the bottom is a Soul Screamers 'Kaylee' mug I won from Rachel Vincent :D

Also won: Dreamwalker, by Andrea Heltsley.

Finally, I'm readlly happy that I got approved on NetGalley for this one:

Death and the Girl Next Door, by Darynda Jones. I haven't read anything by this author before but what I've heard and also the description of the novel makes me excited for this one!


On another note:
I'm behind on the sequels challenge... I've finished Enshadowed, but that means I still have to read 3 books in 9 days, while I actually have a few NetGalley books that will be published very soon and/or are about to expire >.< I also find it very hard to resist the copies of Carnival of Souls, Origin, and Unspoken on my shelf...

What was in your mailbox this week? Link me up in the comments :)