All the Stars and Teeth

"...we all know the danger of multiple magics. How they consume you slowly, and then all at once." ~ Adalyn Grace, All the Stars and Teeth

Synopsis

Set in a kingdom where danger lurks beneath the sea, mermaids seek vengeance with song, and magic is a choice.

She will reign.

As princess of the island kingdom Visidia, Amora Montara has spent her entire life training to be High Animancer — the master of souls. The rest of the realm can choose their magic, but for Amora, it’s never been a choice. To secure her place as heir to the throne, she must prove her mastery of the monarchy’s dangerous soul magic.

When her demonstration goes awry, Amora is forced to flee. She strikes a deal with Bastian, a mysterious pirate: he’ll help her prove she’s fit to rule, if she’ll help him reclaim his stolen magic.

But sailing the kingdom holds more wonder — and more peril — than Amora anticipated. A destructive new magic is on the rise, and if Amora is to conquer it, she’ll need to face legendary monsters, cross paths with vengeful mermaids, and deal with a stow-away she never expected… or risk the fate of Visidia and lose the crown forever.

I am the right choice. The only choice. And I will protect my kingdom.

My Review

All the Stars and Teeth is the first instalment of a YA fantasy duology by Adalyn Grace. The synopsis promises magic, monsters, mermaids, a princess and a pirate, and this dark magical high sea adventure didn't disappoint!

We have Amora, the main protagonist, princess of Visidia and welder of soul magic! Amora has been kept away from the other Islands and seas in the kingdom by her father and under his instruction she has been prepared to contain the most dangerous form of magic and acted as executioner of those with no chance of redemption from a young age. On the day she's set to demonstrate she can control her magic and everything goes wrong and this leads her on a dangerous sea adventure with a mysterious pirate called Bastian, and some others along the way!

What this entails is a wonderful adventure in a world of magic that sits and flows through various Islands within the kingdom of Visidia in various shapes and forms. I love the magical systems which varied from soul magic, to elemental magic, to time magic! Each magical subset was detailed and specific and the introduction of characters using their magic was a joy to read. Add in scary sea monsters, magical mermaids using their powers at sea, against some bloodthirsty action including cutting off limbs, tooth and blood fused magic, and you'll understand how thrilling and high pace this story is.

Amora, a worthy and feisty heroine is right in the middle of the action and takes no prisoners. She's a strong female character, while still showing vulnerability and humanity, and this is a strong theme throughout the book especially when having to fight against patriarchal imbalances! She learns some truths about what's really going on in the kingdom and moves forward bravely (albeit putting herself in danger sometimes) without making excuses for herself or for others!

The relationship between Amora and Bastien, the mysterious pirate whose magic has been stolen, is both fun and romantic. The relationship between the main group of characters is something I loved - characters so very different but who formed a connection and sense of loyalty that made them a formidable group together.

If you love dark magic, high sea swash-buckling adventures and strong female protagonists, you will love All the Stars and Teeth!

4 stars from me for this wonderful epic fantasy!

Thank you to Sarah Mathers at Titan Books for the ARC. I was #gifted this book in exchange for an honest review

About the Author

Adalyn Grace is a New York Times bestselling author of All the Stars and Teeth, which was called “2020’s biggest YA fantasy” by Entertainment Weekly.

Prior to becoming an author, Adalyn spent four years working in live theatre, acted as the managing editor of a nonprofit newspaper, and studied storytelling as an intern on Nickelodeon Animation’s popular series The Legend of Korra.

Local to San Diego, Adalyn spends her non-writing days by watching too much anime, and by playing video games with her bossy cat and two dorky dogs.

More information and where to buy to buy this book

Amazon.co.uk
Waterstones

• Paperback : 397 pages
• ISBN-10 : 1789094062
• ISBN-13 : 978-1789094060
• Publisher : Titan Books (UK); Titan Edition (4 Aug. 2020)

Love is What You Bake of it (The Meraki Series Book 1) by Effie Kammenou  ~ Review & Tour with Love Books Group

Backcover blurb

The only love Kally Anadarakis is baking is in the form of the sweet treats she whips up in her café, The Coffee Klatch. Kally never believed herself to be a person worthy of love, but when an intoxicating man she considered out of her league pursues her, she risks everything to be with him. Later, when tragedy strikes, truths are revealed that leave Kally brokenhearted and untrusting.

Eight years later, Kally is a successful pastry chef running the café she’d always dreamed of owning. With a home of her own, a profession she’s passionate about, and the support and love of friends and family, Kally is content with the life she has carved out for herself.

Until the day Max Vardaxis walks into her café…

With arguing parents, meddling relatives, an overly energetic grandmother, a man-crazy best friend, and the long ago, mysterious disappearance of a grandfather, this new man in town is just one more complication in Kally’s life, if not the main one. Kally must now decide whether to keep her heart safe or to once again take a ‘whisk on love.’

My Review

Meet Kally Andarakis, baker and owner of the sweet treats café ‘The Coffee Klatch’. After being badly hurt and devasted by a previous relationship, she closes her heart to love and concentrates on running the café and her relationships with friends and wonderful mix of different characters within Kally’s ‘very opinionated Greek family’. She’s content leaving romance to the heroines in her romance books until sexy police offer Max Vardaxis walks into her life! Both have complicated backgrounds linked to previous relationships and are carrying their own secrets and heartaches while being undeniably attracted to each other. It’s these secrets that play a big part in misunderstandings which threaten to keep them apart and Kelly has to decide if she’s really willing to open her heart to love and trust again.

With their undeniable chemistry this story is sexy meets sweet! There’s lovely sweet Greek recipes within the book, descriptions that conjure up images of sweet sugary treats dished up at the café, and the fully developed range of characters -  undeniably human with flaws and all, are mostly sweet at their centre. The author really highlighted the inner workings of family dynamics into this book and it added an extra layer to the story.

Although the main theme of this novel is romance, there’s some mystery and adventure stemming from the disappearance of her grandfather during the Greek coup in the 1960s, and it’s also very funny! Kally’s grandmother is a riot and was one of my favourite characters and I loved the close relationship between the two.

Best read while curled up on the sofa with a hot drink and a cupcake or two!

A cute and light-hearted read with sweet treats

3/5 Stars

Thank you to Love Books Tour for the ARC. I was #gifted this book in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you to everyone who has stopped by – I hope you have enjoyed my review.  Please check out the rest of this blog tour for more thoughts and reviews about this book!

More information and where to buy to buy this book
Format: Kindle Edition: Amazon | Book Depository 

About the author

Effie Kammenou is a believer that it is never too late to chase your dreams, follow your heart or change your career. She is proof of that. At one time, long ago, she'd thought that, by her age, she would have had an Oscar in her hand after a successful career as an actor. Instead, she worked in the optical field for 40 years and is the proud mother of two accomplished young women.

Effie Kammenou is a first generation Greek-American who lives on Long Island with her husband and two daughters. When she’s not writing, or posting recipes on her food blog, cheffieskitchen.wordpress.com, you can find her entertaining family and friends or traveling for ‘research.’

As an avid cook and baker, a skill she learned from watching her Athenian mother, she incorporated traditional Greek family recipes throughout the books.

She holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Theater Arts from Hofstra University.

For updates on promotions, events and new releases, follow Effie on Twitter @EffieKammenou & www.facebook.com/EffieKammenou

Love is What You Bake of it is the first book in a new series. Kally has two sisters. Each book will focus mainly on one of the three young women. They also have a half-brother. epending on how the story unfolds over the three books, I may write a story for him as well. The name of the series is called The Meraki Series.  Meraki - A small Greek word with a complex definition. In essence, it means to put your soul into something—anything done with great passion, absolute devotion, and undivided attention—a labor of love.

Burn by Patrick Ness ~ Review 

Book Blurb

From the award-winning author of A Monster Calls, Monsters of Men and The Knife of Never Letting Go comes a brand new, highly anticipated book. Patrick Ness and DRAGONS - what more could one ask for? “Sarah Dewhurst is just a small town girl. Well, she was until Kazimir showed up. Kazimir is the dragon that her father has hired to work on their farm. A  dragon that only accepted the work because of a prophecy that has an assassin, a cult of dragon worshippers and two FBI agents at its heart. And of course, Sarah herself, not that she knows it yet. From the Author of A Monster Calls and the Chaos Walking Series comes a brand new story of friendship, bravery and second chances in a world where we're our own worst enemies.”

My Review

"She is fire without boundary and would devour everything".

I knew that Burn was a fantasy novel involving 'dragons' and a prophecy with a girl called Sarah at it's centre, so I was excited to start reading.This book, however, is about so much more than what it seems on the surface. It's hard to explain without giving away any of the plot or secrets but you know how much I love the weird and the wonderful and this was it!

An intricate plot and world building at it's best mixing magic and myths with realism that just flowed across the page. In the first half of the book we learn about the key players in this alternative version of the USA as well as the existence of dragons, and there's a few unexpected surprises along with way!

Told through multiple povs, the pace really picks up in the second half and I struggled to put the book down. It's fast and furious in parts but the story still flows with twists and turns until the big showdown at the end.

Early on in the book Sarah's dad warns her to stay away from the dragon and makes a comment that 'dragons don't have souls' and that they're 'different'. With some diverse (poc and queer rep) main characters, this is something that is picked up throughout the book under different strands including racism and homophobia, and religion, the threat of war among 'men', and dragons versus humans. We see it in the behaviour of the racist police deputy Kelby, the threat of war between the US and Russia (satellite and spying agendas), and again in the distrust between dragons and humans.

Standout characters for me include Sarah for her braveness and spirit, Kazimir who is also brave, wise and weird, plus he's a dragon, Malcolm's character development and a fire breathing baddie in this book who goes all out (no name given for spoiler reasons)!

Burn is an amazing epic fantasy adventure with dragons, but at the same time the core of this book also looks at the human mind, humanity and coexisting. How a person can be 'nothing special' but by the act of doing, be something very special indeed! There's sad moments mixed in with the sweet, beautiful friendships formed, and for some, there's a chance at redemption.

5 stars from me for this wonderful epic fantasy!

Thank you to @tandemcollectiveuk & @walkerbooksya for sending me this book. I was #gifted this book in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you to everyone who has stopped by – I hope you have enjoyed my review. Please check out the #Burnreadalong stories in my Instagram page https://www.instagram.com/miss_bohemia for more thoughts and reviews about this book!

About the Author

"I’m Patrick Ness. I claim three states in America as my home (as Americans are wont to do): I was born in Virginia, my first memories are Hawaiian, and I went to junior high and high school in Washington. Then I lived in California for college (at USC) and moved to the United Kingdom in 1999, where I’ve lived (mostly in London) ever since.

I’ve written nine books: 2 novels for adults (The Crash of Hennington and The Crane Wife), 1 short story collection for adults (Topics About Which I Know Nothing) and 6 novels for young adults (The Knife of Never Letting Go, The Ask and the Answer, Monsters of Men, A Monster Calls, More Than This and The Rest of Us Just Live Here).

For these books, I’ve won the Carnegie Medal twice, the Costa Children’s Book Award, the Guardian Children’s Fiction Prize, the Red House Book Award, the Jugendliteratur Preis, the UKLA Award, the Booktrust Teenage Prize and the fabulous, fabulous, fabulous Jim Kay also won the Greenaway for his illustrations in A Monster Calls (so buy that version, would you?).

I write screenplays as well, including for the movie version of A Monster Calls starring Liam Neeson, Sigourney Weaver and Felicity Jones, out January 2017.

I love the Decemberists, Peter Carey and A&W Cream Soda. I dislike onions. Intensely."

More information and where to buy to buy this book

PUBLICATION DATE: 07.05.2020

PUBLISHED BY: WALKER BOOKS /

RRP: 12.99

Waterstones | Book Depository | Amazon.co.uk

Night of the Dragon By Julie Kagawa - Blog Tour 

Join me in my journey as the final stop of Blog Tour for Night of the Dragon and hold onto your seats because it's a rollarcoaster of a ride!

Book Blurb

All is lost: In a desperate last-chance attempt to stop the Master of Demons from calling upon the Great Kami dragon - and making the wish that will plunge the empire into darkness and destruction - Yumeko and her ragtag band of companions must journey to the wild cliffs of Iwagoto.

But even with their combined skills and powers, this most unlikely team of heroes knows the forces of evil may be impossible to overcome.

And now there is another layer in the battle, a player who has been watching and waiting for the right moment, that no one even realised existed...until now.

As darkness rises and chaos reigns, a fierce kitsune and her shadowy protector must face down the greatest evil of all in the epic conclusion to the Shadow of the Fox trilogy.

My Review

Night of the Dragon is the third and final part of the Shadow of the Fox trilogy and having recently read the first two books, I was ready to jump into this book headfirst and it didn’t disappoint!

I had already fallen in love with the ‘unlikely team of heroes’ and this exciting YA Japanese fantasy, and couldn’t wait to see what happened next. The second book ended with the Scrolls of a Thousand Prayers now in the hands of the Master of Demons! While our unlikely heroes are down (but not out), if there’s one thing we’ve learned, it’s that as long as they still breathe, there’s still a chance to turn things around! Unfortunately, it’s not just the Master of Demons who stands in their way, - foes are fierce and there’s monsters, demons, gods, witches, shinobi warriors etc and some powerful secret enemies are waiting in the background too. Everything’s at stake because whoever holds the Scrolls of a Thousand Prayers can claim a wish from the great Kami Dragon, which could change the fate of the empire and cause death and devastation. This fateful journey is going to require everything from them, not just skill, power and magic, but a steely determination, faith in each other and at times unshakeable belief.

Yumeko, half kitsune, half human has grown up having to hide her true nature and we get to see her magic blossom to the fullest. Samurai Kage Tatsumi character goes through some of the biggest of changes and though his POV in this story, it’s great to not only delve into his mind to see how these changes came about but also his internal struggles with Hakaimano. We also learn more about , how his fate intertwined with Yumeko. Okame was one of my favourite characters, he was tough on the outside but really had a heart of gold and was hilarious! Teamed up with Daisuke they made the sweetest pair.

This story is complex, fast-paced (along with slower sweet moments) and so rich in Japanese mythology;- the descriptive world building, the forms and shapes and history of magic weave wonderfully around the characters. All the characters (from humans to yoki and kami) are fully developed and described so vividly that you can’t help but conjure them up in your head while reading. Julie really brought the battles - sword fighting, combat, physical and mental magic - to life.

The book answered questions I’d had about the true nature of Yumeko and as well as finding out about her past, we even get a glimpse into what her future looks like. I loved this series and the final conclusion wrapped everything up perfectly up at the end - the questions I had and the mysterious pasts and links to different characters all came together.

You can’t help but want everyone to survive and win and so it hurts (as it should) when blood gets spilled and when you sometimes have to say goodbye. The unlikeliest friendships and a mishmash of heroes became a formidable team! It was an exciting and emotional read and I was left feeling fulfilled but with a heavy heart.

5 stars from me for this wonderful epic fantasy!

Thank you to Sian Baldwin at HQStories and Julie Kagawa for the ARC. I was #gifted this book in exchange for an honest review.

Follow The Blog Tour 

Thank you to everyone who has stopped by – I hope you have enjoyed my review. Please check out the rest of this blog tour for more thoughts and reviews about this book!

About the Author

Julie Kagawa was born in Sacramento, California. But nothing exciting really happened to her there. So, at the age of nine she and her family moved to Hawaii, which she soon discovered was inhabited by large carnivorous insects, colonies of house geckos, and frequent hurricanes. She spent much of her time in the ocean, when she wasn’t getting chased out of it by reef sharks, jellyfish, and the odd eel.

When not swimming for her life, Julie immersed herself in books, often to the chagrin of her schoolteachers, who would find she hid novels behind her Math textbooks during class. Her love of reading led her to pen some very dark and gruesome stories, complete with colored illustrations, to shock her hapless teachers. The gory tales faded with time, but the passion for writing remained, long after she graduated and was supposed to get a real job. To pay the rent, Julie worked in different bookstores over the years, but discovered the managers frowned upon her reading the books she was supposed to be shelving. So she turned to her other passion: training animals. She worked as a professional dogtrainer for several years, dodging Chihuahua bites and overly enthusiastic Labradors, until her first book sold and she stopped training to write full-time.

Julie now lives in Louisville, Kentucky, where the frequency of shark attacks are at an all time low. She lives with her husband, two obnoxious cats, one Australian Shepherd who is too smart for his own good, and the latest addition, a hyper-active Papillon puppy.

Julie is the author of the bestselling Iron Fey series. The Iron Knight the fourth title in The Iron Fey series publishes in Jan 2012. The Immortal Rules, the first title in a brand new series publishes in May 2012.

Visit Julie's Website 

Follow Julie on Twitter  | Instagram

More information and where to buy to buy this book

Amazon | Waterstones