Top Ten Tuesday: most underrated books in certain genres

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.


Hey guys :) This week's topic was to pick a genre and spotlight ten books that we think are underrated within that category. My problem is that I can't think of a single genre where I can find so many underrated books! I mean I could easily give you ten awesome vampire novels or dystopians or whatever, but not all of them would be underappreciated. So I'm picking more than one genre.


Underrated reaper books


The Croak series by Gina Damico
These books are hilarious! Well, serious too because they're about death. But you can't read this without laughing. And Mrs Damico has the most awesome ideas! Just wait until you see the jellyfish or her version of the afterlife. Also, the romance is refreshingly non-sappy.

The Soul Screamers series by Rachel Vincent
This is also to a big extent a series about banshees, but the reapers become more important as it goes on. Also, there is Tod, my favorite reaper and one of my favorite male leads in general. He has the best black sense of humor. Also, the world building here is extensive and original - big plus! No weird, unresolved for-the-sake-of-plot convenient stuff. Things go badly. People die. The survivors continue to fight.


Underrated contemporaries


Notes from the Blender by Trish Cook and Brendan Halpin
Two very different teens (queen of high school / the metal guy) suddenly have to deal with living together because their parents are getting married. It's both hilarious and sad and just generally wonderful :)

Collide by J.R. Lenk
I found this one on a list of books with bisexual characters, but I ended up reading to a big part because of the music. In a way, this was my scene when I was a teen (minus the parties). This was my music. These were, to an extent, my people. Reading this was like taking a trip down the this-might-have-been-me road of memory lane. It's really well-written! To bad I can't find anything else by the author...

Lovely Vicious by Sara Wolf
I bought this one on a whim and read the whole thing in one night (yes, until like four in the morning). I just couldn't stop. I just like how nobody is who you first think they are and I thought the voice was very strong.


Underrated YA crime/thriller


I Hunt Killers (Jasper Dent series) by Barry Lyga
I always think this series is huge but then sometimes I think that not all that many people have heard of it. I'm not sure. Either way, it's fantastic and I think more people should read it. Jasper is a really untypical and lead with a complex personality. However, this is about gruesome murders. So you shouldn't be easily put-off.

The Book of Blood and Shadow by Robin Wasserman
I mainly read this one because parts of it are set in Prague, but I got sucked in by the mystery/thriller element. Couldn't stop reading. So many possible suspects. So many secrets. But again, not a sunshiny read. This title is to be taken seriously.


Underrated historical / steampunk


Dearly, Departed by Lia Habel
This is one of my favorite steampunk/zombie novels. I love it. I love the world building, I love Nora, I love Bram, I love the type of relationship they have together. I love that the book is both action-packed and bloody but also funny and romantic. Also, it talks about important social questions that apply to our own world as well.

Something Strange & Deadly by Susan Dennard
I think with the sequels, this series has garnered more attention, but still not all that much compared to other YA fantasy novels. Which is a pity because again, great steampunk/zombie historical combination. There's both awesome mechanical stuff but also magic and social boundaries and family issues. I really need to get the third one now that it's out...

The Faerie Ring by Kiki Hamilton
I've only read the first two but I loved them! It's Victorian London with faeries, and the protagonist is a girl thief living on the street. I love how it picks up on how many Victorians believed faeries existed alongside them and how it portrays both the hardships of life on the street but also the companionship between Tiki and her chosen family.


So, that was it from me. Do you know any of them? Do you agree they are underrated, or do you think they are already getting enough attention? And what did you pick this week? Link me up in the comments :)

Rogue by Gina Damico blog tour and scavenger hunt with an awesome giveaway!

Hey guys, today I am super excited to be part of the blog tour for Rogue, the last book in Gina Damico's awesome Croak Trilogy! If you love reapers, sarcasm, craziness and countless death jokes, you should definitely give this series a try! You can read my review of Scorch, the second book, here.
Also, check out the trailer!

And now I'm handing the word over to Gina Damico herself to explain to you guys how this tour is a little different from what you usually see around the blogosphere.

Hey hey Croak fans! Welcome to my blog tour / photo hunt / Roguestravaganza!

From now until ROGUE's release on September 10th, each stop on the tour will reveal an image that represents a chapter in the book - could refer to setting, plot, an important object, mood, or whatever other diabolical visualizations with which I feel like tormenting my dear readers. Each image also contains a hidden letter...though really, they're not that well hidden. (If you have eyes, you should be able to spot them.) Collect the letters every day, and at the end of the tour I'll hold a contest, the winner of which will receive signed and annotated copies of the complete trilogy. (For a complete description of the contest, tour schedule, and links to the stops you might have missed, check out the blog tour page on my website.)

So! This photo is for Chapter 4. I will let the image do the talking.

Thanks for having me! Good luck everyone!

What could this wooden fish possibly mean? Does it mark a town? Is it an omen for dinner? Is it a red herring? Post your theories in the comments and don't forget to follow the tour in order to figure out the solution to the contest!


ABOUT ROGUE

Release date: September 10, 2013
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Format: Paperback, 336 pages

Plot Summary:
Teenage Grim Reaper Lex’s power to Damn souls is getting out of control. She's a fugitive, on the run from the maniacal new mayor of Croak and the townspeople who want to see her pay the price for her misdeeds. Uncle Mort rounds up the Junior Grims to flee Croak once again, but this time they're joined by Grotton, the most powerful Grim of all time. Their new mission is clear: fix his mistakes, or the Afterlife will cease to exist, along with all the souls in it.

The gang heads for Necropolis, the labyrinth-like capital city of the Grimsphere. There, they discover that the Grimsphere needs a reboot. To do that, the portals to the Afterlife must be destroyed...but even that may not be enough to fix the damage. Things go from bad to worse, and when at last the fate of the Afterlife and all the souls of the Damned hang in the balance, it falls to Lex and her friends to make one final, impossible choice.

AUTHOR LINKS

Website   Facebook   Twitter   Goodreads 

Amazon   Barnes&Noble   Indiebound 

GIVEAWAY

That's right! On every stop of the tour, Gina is giving away an awesome Croak prize pack! That's 3 signed bookmarks, 3 signed book plates, 3 magnets, and a scythe pendant! This is open internationally! Just follow the rules and enter the rafflecopter below :)

Rules:

• one entry per person/household
• you must be at least 13 years old
• winner will be emailed and has 48h to get back to me, otherwise I choose someone else
• I give the winner's info to the author, she sends you the prize
• cheating on one of your entries results in disqualification
• please read carefully what I actually want in the rafflecopter entry box! (For instance, don't copy-paste your tweet, give me its URL!)

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Review: With All My Soul, by Rachel Vincent

Release date: March 26, 2013
Publisher: Harlequin Teen
Format: Paperback, 377 pages

Goodreads description:
What does it mean when your school is voted the most dangerous in America? It's time to kick some hellion butt...

After not really surviving her junior year (does "undead" count as survival?), Kaylee Cavanaugh has vowed to take back her school from the hellions causing all the trouble. She's going to find a way to turn the incarnations of Avarice, Envy and Vanity against one another in order to protect her friends and finish this war, once and forever.

But then she meets Wrath and understands that she's closer to the edge than she's ever been. And when one more person close to her is taken, Kaylee realizes she can't save everyone she loves without risking everything she has...



The following review is based on a copy I won in Rachel from Fiktshun's With All My Soul Mini-Challenge. Thanks again for hosting it, Rachel!


Review (no spoilers):
It’s been a while since I’ve finished the last book in a longer series. Final books are always a double-edged sword for me: on the one hand, I can’t wait to see how everything turns out and to find some sort of closure. On the other hand, this is the final goodbye. Although I’ve only known the characters in Rachel Vincent’s Soul Screamers series for a bit over a year, the thought that I’ll never read about Kaylee, Tod, Nash, Sabine & co again hurts – even if I’m happy with the way their story ended!

The ending of Before I Wake left me reeling. So many dead! Emma in a new body. Her sister still pregnant. Avari and the other hellions still a threat. Well, let me say that Kaylee is sick and tired of being threatened. In this last book of the series, she is struggling with an emotion we previously don’t notice as much in her: anger. Such a wealth of it, in fact, that she captures the attention of Ira, a hellion of Wrath. Now before you think ‘great, another hellion is just what she needed’ let me tell you that Ira is quite different from the other hellions in the books. He’s dangerous as they come, of course, but I actually… liked him. I was fascinated by him. That fact that he’s described as rather handsome didn’t hurt, neither did his obvious distaste for Avari. And though his price is steep, he could help Kaylee free herself from Avari… if she is willing to pay.

Want a taste of him? There you go...

"I am the hot thrum of blood rushing through your veins. Every thud of knuckles against flesh is the cry of my true name. I am the glint of rage in your ex's eyes, the livid grinding of his teeth. My pulse is the wave of anger washing over the crowd. The swin of a corpse from the noose. The final twitch of a man murdered in revenge. I know you, Kaylee Cavanaugh. I know you very, very well, and I can give you what you want most in the world." (With All My Soul, page 82)

I really liked that we got to see Kaylee angry for once: It only makes sense. The book starts with Emma’s funeral, which Emma is attending in the body of the girl that used to be Lydia. Then there is Emma’s sister, pregnant with an incubus baby and determined to keep it even though it will probably be her death sentence. Furthermore, Avari has once more abducted some of the people that are most precious to her. In short, Kaylee has every right to be pissed and she wants to free herself and her loved ones of this hellion threat once and for all.

Yet as always, she isn’t alone in this mess, and there are a lot of discussions among the group about taking risks. I liked this because the others called Kaylee out on her sometimes a bit hypocritical habit of wanting to face all the dangers for those she loves and not granting others their right to do the same thing. The group dynamic and dialogue in the book were fantastic, as always! Sabine is of course a great addition to that, and I love how she gets so many mean-but-true lines!

Emma’s character arc was another part of the book I really enjoyed. The transition from one body to another wasn’t exactly smooth for her, and she has to face the truth that she’s actually quite a bit more vain than she thought. Instead of blond, tall, and curvy she is now rather flat and mousy. She isn’t used to nobody paying her any attention. Add to that the fact that Lydia’s body is providing her with a new set of abilities she is struggling to control, and that she has to watch her family mourning her own death. Oh, and let’s not forget that her body is technically that of an asylum escapee… and you know how hard these places are to check out of, right?

Then, of course, there’s the romance *sigh* I love Tod and Kaylee so much. They have the type of relationship I’d hope to find with someone one day. They support one another but give each other their space. I love how they’re equal to each other, able to stand on their own, but stronger together. And yes, we do get some wonderful, swoon-worthy scenes between the two of them… but also plenty bittersweet ones. Especially towards the ending, when Kaylee has to make a difficult and painful decision.

I don’t really know what else I can talk about without spoilers. Let’s just say that even though With All My Soul didn’t pack the same emotional punch that If I Die and Before I Wake had for me (I don’t know why, might just be me/the mood I was in) it is definitely a worthy conclusion to the series! It continues the great mixture of painful/gruesome scenes and fun dialogue I enjoy so much. Once it gets going, you will not want to put it down, and there’s a twist I really wasn’t expecting!

In the end, all the plot strands and questions are resolved, but there is also a certain openness regarding the futures of those who survive, which I think is a great balance. Ira is a surprising but genius addition to the series and I’m kind of sad that we only get to spend one book with him. If you’ve been scared to read this last book and see the series end I can tell you this: it will not be painless, but it will leave you satisfied, so go out and get it already ;)


Have you read With All My Soul already, or started the series at all? What are your thoughts? Any remarks on my review? Let me know in the comments :)

Review: Scorch (Croak #2), by Gina Damico

Release Date: September 25, 2012
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Format: Paperback, 332 pages

From the back of the book:
Croak used to be the only place where Lex, a teenage Grim Reaper, felt like she fit in. But after she let the murderous Zara get away - and inadvertently transferred her ability to Damn souls to her on top of that - Lex is a pariah in the little town full of Grims. Her Junior Grim friends have stood by her, but that has only made them outcasts. Meanwhile, Zara is still out there Damning innocents, and no one is safe. It's up to Lex's Uncle Mort, mayor of Croak, to protect the townspeople. But when tragedy strikes, the Grims rise up against him,too.

To escape their wrath, Mort takes Lex and the other Juniors on a wild road trip to DeMyse, a glitzy Grim city, where they can hide out until the chaos in Croak subsides. Though this sparkling desert oasis is full of luxuries and amusements, Lex wants nothing more than to return to her simple little town and the good graces of its citizens. Her best chance at that would be to stop Zara once and for all - but how can she do that from DeMyse, where the Grims seem mysteriously oblivious to Zara's killing spree? Lex needs to track down the secret book that would make Zara even more dangerous. But she has no idea of the chilling lengths her nemesis will go to in order to find it first.

The following review is based on a copy I purchased with my own hard-earned money.

Review (no spoilers):
I read this quite a long time ago but I want to review it anyway. I absolutely loved Croak and I didn’t get around to reviewing that one so I want to do better this time. I might have left out something awesome due to muddled memory though…

Scorch picks up pretty much right where Croak left off. Lex is a mess after her sister’s death at the hands of Zara, a reaper who has stolen her ability to Damn as well as one of the ‘loopholes’ that allows her to Crash (e.g. scythe to anyplace she wants and basically kill at will and off schedule). Once Lex gets back to Croak with her uncle Mort, many of the locals aren’t exactly happy to see her, blaming her for everything that’s happened and afraid of her abilities. They suspect her of basically going wherever and Damning whoever she wants – and there is plenty of Damning being done by Zara, who seems to be completely out of it. The town turns against pretty much all of the juniors, taking away their freedoms and rights and eventually forcing uncle Mort to abdicate as mayor after a terrorist bomb attack. Everything in me bristled at how they were treated and at the way certain members of the community manipulated everyone else!

Through all of those grim things there was still Gina Damico’s incredible sense of humor to lighten up the gloom and doom. When Lex finally dares to visit her twin sister in the Afterlife, Cordy is not mad at her as she had feared! Instead, she’s travelling and enjoying herself and even managed to snatch a pharaoh as a sort-of-boyfriend. Also, Lex and Driggs continue their relationship, finding ever-new places to make-out without Mort noticing. I really love the snark and dynamics between those two, they always manage to crack me up!

Mort is just plain awesome, definitely one of my favorite character (I hope we get to know more about his past! A novella-flashback thing of Mort as a teen would be cool!). He makes decisions quickly and doesn’t beat around the bush or sugarcoat his words, and he’s ready to flaunt the rules if his moral compass points him that way. When things go south, he grabs the juniors and whirls everyone away to DeMyse (gotta love those Grim town names!) which is basically a grim reaper Las Vegas – glitzy, shrill, way-out-there. It was interesting to see the different effect the city had on the juniors and how they eventually got their act back together.

The last part of the book was incredibly fast-paced as twist after twist was added, secrets exposed, things explained… and injustice after injustice was done to my favorite characters. I really hurt for them, but I also have hope. And that one final plot twist!! I never saw that one coming, I swear, but it’s plain awesome genius! I can’t really say much without spoiling it for everyone.

What I didn’t expect was to feel sorry for Zara at times. I really liked her in the first book before her betrayal was revealed. I sort of hated her then for a moment, but after what she’s been through… I could understand how she got to the place she ended up at. And the times she shows up in Scorch, she’s just so… damaged. As she gets worse and worse I really did feel for her even though she was supposedly the enemy.

Another thing I really enjoyed in the novel was getting to know more about the Grimsphere and how it works. DeMyse is extremely different from Croak and I liked comparing the two. The world-building is really expanded in this book and the problems being a reaper brings with itself (e.g. Lex’s parents, basically having lost two daughters since Lex isn’t around anymore) are not simply left out.

Gina Damico’s books are the perfect combination of humor and dark, deadly themes (don’t read this if you have problem with jokes about death!) and even though my review might make the book look quite heavy, I can’t count the times I laughed out loud while I was reading in public places! I read Scorch in a day, the writing flows really easily and the pace never drags. The characters all gained more depth than in the first book, and by the end, the whole plot is so much ‘bigger’ than I ever expected! Also, you can’t go wrong with a book that has a map in it. I need the next book, which will be called Rogue, asap! In the meantime, check out Gina Damico’s blog because it’s awesome and will give your laughing muscles a workout.


And because I like them so much, here are the trailers for Croak and Scorch:

Have you guys read either of these books? What did you think? Do you like Reaper books in general? Let me know in the comments :)

Book Trailer Thursday: Scorch, by Gina Damico

I don't post book trailers very often because many of them don't work for me. And I don't know if I like the media transfer from printed word to short film or section of pictures that much, especially if they end up relying heavily on text after all - what's the point of the clip in that case? Then again, there are very well-done trailers that have made me crave a book.

Aaaanyway, I love the Croak series by Gina Damico! And the book trailer for Croak was actually one of the main things that made me want to read this book as soon as possible. So when she released the Scorch trailer a few days ago, I was glad that she kept it in the same style and picked up on the previous one. I also like that the humor and voice of the book totally transfer to the trailer!

And just in case you haven't seen it or don't know the series, here's the one for Croak:

Oh, and you can check out Gina Damico's blog and original post here.

So what are your thoughts? Love? Hate? You can also share what you thought of the book(s) if you've read it/them and would rather comment on that than on the trailers.

Waiting on Wednesday: Reaping Me Softly, by Kate Evangelista

Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly meme created by Jill at Breaking The Spine to showcase books we can't wait to get our greedy bookish fingers on. Here's my pick this week:

Expected release: October 30th, 2012
Publisher: Omnific Publishing
Format: Paperback

Goodreads Description:
Ever since a near-death-experience on the operating table, seventeen-year-old Arianne Wilson can see dead people. Just as she’s learned to accept her new-found talents, she discovers that the boy she’s had a crush on since freshman year, Niko Clark, is a Reaper.

At last they have something in common, but that doesn’t mean life is getting any easier. All while facing merciless bullying from the most powerful girl in school, Arianne’s world is turned upside down after Niko accidentally reaps the soul of someone she loves. This sends them both into a spiral that threatens to end Arianne’s life. But will Niko break his own Reaper’s code to save her? And what would the consequences be if he did?


I discovered this one when the cover was revealed last week. It's so gorgeous! I love reaper books and I'm curious to see how the theme is handled in this one and who that person Niko accidentally reaps is. I also enjoy reading about characters who have to deal with divided loyalties, so I think this one will be a great read :)

What are your thoughts on my pick, and what are you anxiously waiting for? Link me up in the comments :)