Branded

Branded

by Keary Taylor

For most of her life, Jessica has been unable to sleep well. Whenever she falls asleep, she finds herself in the presence of angels, both exalted and condemned. It is her job to stand in the place of someone who has just died and face the judgment of the dead to decide if the soul goes up or down. Every time a decision is made, Jessica suffers from extreme pain and wakes screaming. The scars on her back are proof of her nightmares.

After years of never being believed, Jessica has found a place away from most people where she can fight to stay awake and scream in private when she can't avoid sleep any longer.

When two men appear in her life, Jessica suddenly finds that her dreams are changing and that's not necessarily a good thing.

Final thoughts: This could be so great if the author was better. The idea is fascinating and the beginning of the book sets it up very well. Unfortunately, the writing starts to slip over the course of the book and it just gets worse and worse. There are editing and consistency issues like Jessica's age changing from 24 to 20 in the space of a chapter. Time passes strangely without any clear indications. It starts off pacing over days and then we're suddenly weeks or months later in the timeline. Taylor repeatedly tells the reader things that just don't make sense. "I didn't even notice how the water was ice cold as it hit my skin..." If you didn't even notice it, how could you mention it? She often uses the same adjectives and adverbs repeatedly in the same paragraph. It bugged me no end when she used "amazingly" twice within two sentences. Is there no thesaurus nearby to help find alternate words? The characters started strong and became flat over the course of the book and the ending was rushed, as if Taylor couldn't wait to start on book two. Dull and lifeless at the end, I can't recommend this one to anyone.

Rating: 2/5

Guardian

Guardian

by A.J. Messenger

Declan's life has never been easy. Repeated panic attacks have made her life pretty hellish. Having a huge panic attack on her eighteenth birthday is definitely how she wanted to start the first day of her adulthood.

In walks Alexander Ronin. Tall, gorgeous, and strangely into her, he is everything she's never known that she's always wanted. She's drawn to him, as is every other girl in school. When she's near him, the panic attacks seem to magically go away. She feels calm and centered, and very much attracted to Alexander.

Over time, Alexander reveals that he's not your average guy. He's not even your average human. And he's definitely not the eighteen years of age that he pretends to be.

He's there to protect Declan because she's in real danger. And though he needs to stay close to her, he also needs to stay far away, because his attraction to her is as dangerous to her as the danger he was sent to protect her from.

Final thoughts: Decent read, though there are some story holes and a few issues with characterization. For the relationship, there's a lot of tell instead of show, but the overall story is interesting.

Rating: 3/5

The Watchers

The Watchers

by Lynnie Purcell

I'm skipping the book talk on this one because it's just so very wrong in so many ways.

This book is basically Twilight but with the author addressing all the complaints that people had about Twilight.

So Clare's the daughter of a flighty human and a fallen angel. She's been stalked most of her life because she's not only different from humans, but also different from the other half-breeds out there. Like Bella in Twilight, her powers have come on strong long before they were supposed to, but the author wants to believe that she's not Bella because she's really graceful, instead of clumsy, and she has a snarky sense of humor.

Edward... umm.. sorry! Daniel is a half-breed who's killed quite a few bad guys in his long life (he's now 118 years old). He also goes to high school to keep up appearances and has been "adopted" by two other half-breeds who help him maintain his cover as well as the cover of two other half-breeds. One of those is a half-angel named Jackson who never feels major emotion. (As in Jackson Rathbone who plays Jasper, the empathic vamp who controlled emotions.)

Clare can read minds, while her destined love can not only read minds, but see the future. And he's perfect. He is also the anti-Edward because he doesn't stalk Bella... um, Clare... but instead waits for her to invite him to come into her bedroom whenever he wants, so it's not stalking anymore. He also doesn't force her to stay behind, but only because she'll do whatever she wants anyway. 

There are a ton of similar moments like her not waking up right away and Edw... Daniel... panicking. Enemies finding a way to get Bel... Clare... separated from the others in order to do whatever they wanted to do. Mike is there in this one, though he's a little more sinister and hard to dissuade, and he, too, has a girl who is jealous of Bel... Clare... because of Mike's attention. "Irrevocably" is used to describe their love. There are dog-like creatures that kill half-breeds until they get one that's on their side.

So much more. So much Twilight. So little of me wanting to read it again.

Rating: 2/5

A Shimmer of Angels

A Shimmer of Angels

by Lisa M. Basso

Since around the time of the death of her mother, Rayna has been able to see angels.  When she discovered that others were thinking she was nuts for seeing them, she tried to hide her ability, but it never quite worked out.

Now she's out of the mental health clinic again after multiple stints over the last three years and she thinks she finally has this beat.  Maybe now, with her meds and multiple therapy sessions, she'll finally stop seeing them.

But fate doesn't give Ray a break.

Not only is she seeing an angel in all his glory, with shining wings and stunning looks, now he's going to her school and he's figured out that she knows what he is.  As an added bonus, there's a second angel with black wings who seems to be stalking her at her new job.

Add in the apparent suicides and the threat of a Fallen angel and Rayna may be only seconds away from getting committed to the clinic forever.

Final thoughts:  Super fast read, but not well done.  My biggest problem is Rayna being committed at all, let alone repeatedly.  Committing someone against her will is usually only done when someone is a danger to herself or others, right?  Rayna admits that until now she's only seen about one angel a month and nothing has happened before this, so 3 years of being locked up?  And how can her dad have her committed with just a journal when she's keeping safe and maintaining a job (although she's extremely clumsy)?  It's completely unbelievable, so it makes the rest of the story kind of stupid.  There's also nothing to explain why the angels suddenly appeared to her and I'm wondering why no one is questioning her parentage.  People are talking about a love triangle, but I have the strange feeling that could get kind of gross in future books.  Does no one else suspect Kade, especially after he Fell from heaven for Ray's mother?  It's poorly written, Ray's extremely panicky and whiny, and her family is barely written, let alone caring.

Rating: 2/5

Hollyweird

Hollyweird

by Terri Clark

Aly just won the ultimate grand prize from EnterTEENment Magazine: a trip to Los Angeles to visit the set of her fave show, Paranormal P.I., and meet hunky star Dakota Danvers live and in person!!!!  She gets to take her best friend since, like, forever... yeah! (but has to take her older sister as her chaperone... crud!).

They head out for the best week ever for any pair of teenaged girls during the summer before their senior year.

It's the first truly good thing to happen to her, or at least the first thing she's gotten excited about, since her mother died in a car accident two years before.

Unfortunately, things aren't that easy.  

Hollyweird's favorite actor is really the Son of Satan and his personal assistant is actually an undercover fallen angel sent by the Big Guy Himself to stop the spawn from whatever deadly plan he and his father have created.

Now Aly must come to grips with the fact that all the supes she's watched on TV are real, her celebrity crush is a douchebag, and her fave guy can't be with her because there are "rules" against that kind of thing.

Final thoughts:  I thought this would be a cotton candy book.  It was supposed to be fluffy, light, and filled with sugary sweetness.  Sadly, it really just ticked me off.  Missy served no real purpose except to cause problems.  Des was there to be the human encyclopedia of supes and convince Aly.  And Aly and Des were just STUPID.  You've been warned that you're about to be confronted with the 7 Deadly Sins.  You even count them off, so we know you know them.  And yet when a complimentary cart of never-ending chocolate shows up, you scarf for 45 minutes of Gluttony?!?!  Then, when you complain to the "management", you're strangely sent to the best suite in the house and waited on hand and foot, not noticing all the Sloth everywhere??  And even after you realize those were bad, you Lust after a man in the woman's shower at the beach and Greedily snatch up allegedly discarded designer clothes, shoes, and jewels (worth tens of thousands of dollars)?!?!!  These don't register as problems to you?!?!  So frustrating.  

God texts!?!?!  

Dozens of made-up words, used only once each, that the author then has to have her characters explain?!?  (Seems more like an "OOH!  Look what I can do!  I can make up stuff!")

Those, plus a rushed ending that had things never foreshadowed anywhere earlier in the book (almost a literal Deus ex Machina... how handy!), and a happy ending for all the good guys with no consequences or real danger, make this a poor choice.

Rating: 2/5

Angel Burn

Angel Burn

by L.A. Weatherly

Angels are real.

They have wings.  They glow with a kind of heavenly light.  They fly.  And when they touch you, you feel blissed out and blessed.

What angels don't tell you when they touch you is that they are feeding on your soul.  They suck away your life force and leave behind disease and destruction.

If you've been touched by an angel, you don't have long to live and what life you do have may not be that great.

Alex knows this.  He's hunted angels since his mother was killed by one when he was five.  At 17, he's one of the best angel assassins out there and he knows it.  When he's called to kill Willow Fields, it's just another hunt to him.

Until he see her...

She's like nothing he's ever seen before. She's both human and angel, a combination never thought possible before.

And she's on the most wanted list of the angels out there because it's been predicted that she will lead to the destruction of all angels.

Can Alex figure out what's going on and keep Willow alive long enough to stop the coming invasion?

Final thoughts:  Eh.  I've read better. I've read worse.  Weatherly's writing needs a bit of help.  It's all tell instead of show.  "I hate him"  "I hate her"  "Wow! I love him"  "Strange! I love her"  It's also got a bit of Twilight in it with the girl volunteering to put herself in harm's way for the greater good and the guy ordering her not to and telling her he'll die without her.  Could be better.  I'm not eagerly anticipating the second book (of yet ANOTHER trilogy).  I may read it. I may not.  So... eh.

Rating: 3/5

Afterlife

Afterlife

by Courtney Allison Moulton

Ellie's dreams have recently begun taking on a frightening edge.  Previously, they had been normal (well, as normal as a teenage girl's dreams can be), but now they are becoming violent and real.  When Ellie wakes from them, she has the distinct feeling that these are more like memories because she always feels like she's really there.

And maybe she was.

One day, a gorgeous stranger shows up and tells her that she's much more than an average teen.  She's the Preliator.  For thousands of years she has been reincarnated, killed the descendants of the Fallen, and stopped Lucifer from building an army of souls to fight against the angels of God and Heaven.

It's a little more than a girl like Ellie can take, especially when she can't remember most of it.

It seems she skipped a generation in her reincarnations and no one knows quite why, but they do know that something big is coming and Ellie is the only one who can stop it from destroying everything she knows and loves.

Final thoughts:  I'm conflicted on this one.  On the one hand, it's a pretty decent read.  There's action and romance enough to hold my interest while reading it.  But it didn't grab me and make me want to never put it down; in fact, I didn't read it at all for the entire weekend.  However, I never really felt like giving up on it either.  The first hundred pages or so actually made me angry because it felt like a Buffy rip-off.  A kind of "Chosen One" who is watched, guarded, and taught to slay demons of varying strengths with different kinds of powers.  She has dreams of her past lives.  There's also a love that can't be shared for various reasons, some of which made no sense.  Ellie also has to make up excuses to people to explain how things keep getting destroyed around her, which Buffy got to be a real pro at doing.  There's more, but I don't think I want to go into all of them.

Essentially, this was just ok.  No great shakes.  I'll read the sequel (in yet another trilogy... really!?!?), but I don't think I'll get all bouncy in my chair when it comes out.

Rating: 3/5