The Secrets of the Immortal: Nicholas Flamel

The Secrets of the Immortal : Nicholas Flamel by Michael Scott 

Ok so...These books follow twins..Nicholas and Perenelle Flamel and their adventures in alchemy, sorcery, magic, dark magic....You are introduced to all types of myths and legends, such as the Kraken and Billy the Kid... I thought just that alone was pretty cool. You explore the streets of Paris, old buildings... This series is great! There is just SO much packed into these books that I honestly don't know where to begin. So...I'll let you read them and find out for yourself! :)

All around, I loved this series. I was constantly being entertained by all these myths coming together in one story. It was great! :) Prepare to be amazed!

Happy Reading!
-Z

The Trylle Trilogy

The Trylle Trilogy by Amanda Hocking


First off...Changelings. Ahem..

You follow a girl name Wendy Everly. In the beginning, you find out that her mother tried to kill her on her sixth birthday. Tried to cut her stomach open with the very knife that was meant for her birthday cake. Her mother kept saying how much of a monster she was...how she was supposed to have  a son and that Wendy wasn't her child.

You're thinking to yourself the whole time, what kind of mother is this? She deserves to be locked up in that insane asylum.....Until you find out about/meet Finn Holmes. Finn is a tracker for the Trylle race. He is the one (one of many, I should say) who tracks down changelings when they have reached the right age to return to the rightful families in Forening.  He teaches her all she needs to know about being a Trylle, because after all...she is the princess about to be the queen of the Trylle... but...in the process Wendy falls in love with him...which is forbidden.
You follow them as they battle together, as they are separated..You meet Loki (and as I re-read this entry I realized that it appeared that I was saying Loki was her evil father..he was not. He was a man she eventually falls in love with..bleh.), Wendy's evil father and sweet step mother, a whole other race of Trylle which are trolls... You witness as Wendy's mother dies, as Wendy helps sister cities, her marriages, her betrayal....

This book was a breath of fresh air from all of my normal fantasy books. It presented a race that had never crossed my mind. I loved the forbidden love, however, didn't like the love of Loki...Ugh. I was rooting for Finn the whole time.

However, if you want a break from your norm, this is a great series to pick up. It was one that I couldn't put down (I know I say that about pretty much every book)...But I am only going to blog about the good ones :)

I found myself combining this book however with other ones in my head and introduced Wendy to the Nephilim from the Mortal Instruments and Stefan and Damon from the Vampire Diaries. This book was a great book but I really wish someone would spin off from it! :)


Happy Reading!
-Z

Odd Thomas

The Odd Thomas Series by Dean Koontz

I have to admit that this series was by far my favorite series...until Harry Dresden. I loved following "Oddy" on his adventures. Odd Thomas can see ghosts. He helps them. He also has a best friend ghost, as I liked to call him, of Elvis Presley. Basically this whole series is built on him trying to help the dead with their unresolved missions so that they can pass on to the other side.

I absolutely fell in love with the character of Thomas. Following him from his normal life to even his monk life...Yes, he went to a monastery and stayed for a while... I love his interaction with ghosts and how hell bent he was on helping them...going through whatever it took.

However, I was sooo disappointed with Odd Apocalypse when it came out. I waited YEARS for that book to come out and it is the only book, other than The Taken by Dean Koontz, that I wasn't able to finish. Maybe it was because I waited for so long for it to come out that I forgot a lot of details and just couldn't get back into it. All I know is that I pre-ordered it...Waited SO anxiously for it to be delivered to my kindle...and now I am stuck on chapter 6...and I just can't seem to move from it. It is a series that I will almost have to re-visit and come back to Odd Apocalypse..But for now.. If you read this series, you'll be fascinated right up until the end...and then it's probably going to lose you, as it did for me.


Happy Reading!
-Z

Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival

Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand

Taking a break from all of my fantasy, demon hunter, vampire, immortals books...I read this book a long time ago, but it's still one of those books that will forever change you and the way you look at things. This book is one of few that has utterly moved me.

This book follows Louis Zamperini, an Olympian runner. He was such a good runner and was the fastest, that he earned the nickname Torrence Tornado.
It lets you dive deep into this country's past..The depression era..Then it takes you to the War. Louis was a bombardier on a Bomber plane..Several flights, kills.....The plane crashes and you follow them on a 47 day float at sea. They fought hallucinations, SHARKS...then they land on an island. A Japanese island.  There he is tortured for information, starved, beaten....The type of treatment none of us can even imagine.
Louis was declared lost at sea. When he is finally returned home you follow him on his downward, drunken spiral. PTSD. He finally settles down and is now a motivational speaker.

This man is def. a hero. He survived some of the most wretched treatments and it was an honor to get to read about his life.  For those of you that don't think biographies are your thing....This story is captivating. I never thought that I would be intrigued by something that I have often considered boring. This book inspired me, brought me to tears..had me questioning man-kind. There's a reason it was on the New York Times Best Seller's List........READ IT!

 

http://www.louiezamperini.com/

Happy Reading!
-Z

The Immortals

The Immortals by Alyson Noel


This was another one of those series that I just stumbled into and fell in love with. In a previous blog I mentioned it also added to a Daemon complex I am currently going through...

This book is based around the lives of Damen Auguste and a girl named Ever. Damen is an immortal that is, and even though he never reveals his true age... he is 600 years old, give or take a few years. His father dabbled in alchemy and when he got murdered along with his wife for the elixir that granted immortality... Damen picked up the research and succeeded.

Ever, is a physic girl that walks around in bulky hoodies and an iPod blaring to block out auras and other peoples' thoughts. She acquired these powers from a freak car accident that killed her family. Anddddd she occasionally talks to her dead sister, Riley... Whenever she is around Damen, however, all of that goes away. She doesn't hear random thoughts, she is finally "normal" again.

You follow these two to the Summerland, which allows you to manifest anything you want (which you can also do on the Earth plane...just takes more concentration) and also happens to be what you pass through when you die to get to the other side. You go through their adventure of Damen turning Ever into an immortal, the red tulips (red the book for the meaning on that one! :)), their run-in with an evil Immortal, Roman..Their friendships with Miles and Haven...Roman turning Damen and the whole school into puppets..Ever trying to find a cure...Finding the cure and Roman tricking her into putting her blood into the antidote, insuring that Ever and Damen can never touch without it killing Damen... Ever's down ward spiral, Their visits to the gazebo in the middle of a red tulip field ;), Their quest to the Dark Summerland..Ava, Romy, Rainy, Jude...Ever's personal journey to find a cure for Damen and finding a fruit that frees Immortals...

-inhales- It's such a long, long journey with these two and you find yourself attached with every page turn! I am sorry again for such short synopsis' but, I really don't want to ruin the details... You are going to have to read this one for yourself and I am sure that you won't be let down! I know that I enjoyed my brief glimpse into the world of immortals and exciting lands and being able to manifest whatever you wanted.... Real life should be a little bit more like this! :)


Happy Reading!
-Z

The Lux Series

The Lux Series by Jennifer Armentrout

So, when I finish a series...I am always on the hunt for something else. My love for The Mortal Instruments/The Infernal Devices lead me to a google search..which lead me to some forum...which lead me to this series. A series by a woman from a town that I went to high school in!!!! :) Hooray for local writers! AND! The kicker for me...It's based all around towns that I live in now, have lived in, and was raised in.........Makes me wonder about my origins and who my neighbors really were after reading these.

Ok..so, now that my little fan girl/down home squealings are over...

 The Lux Series is about aliens (that are made up of light) that reside around Seneca Rocks, WVa and a normal girl named Katy. She moves in next door to two of  them and her whole life changes. She goes from vlogging her favorite books ( ^_^ ) to...well...ALIENS. She befriends her neighbor Dee Black, who also has a hot, very grumpy, twin...Daemon.

(This series also started a Damon complex for me...From Obsidian, to the Immortals- I'll blog them later...to the Vampire Dairies TV show...Ugh..Too many Daemons and none of them real -sigh-)

Daemon is a real jack ass to Katy and constantly makes comments about "her kind" and how she needs to stay away from him and Dee. Well...She doesn't and it's not long before Katy ends up risking her life and Daemon saves her using his freaky alien powers...and then the cat is out of the bag. She finds out about the Luxen, their powers, the evil that feeds on the Luxen race, the government program -the Department Of Defense- sought out on keeping them in check and you know..all the typical baggage an alien race would have. You find out that all Luxen are "born" in threes..There is ALWAYS triplets of them. So, you discover the story about Daemon and Dee's lost brother, Dawson and his girlfriend Bethany. Which then turns into an adventure into saving them, which happens rather unexpectedly (I'm not gonna ruin this one...READ IT!) and then you end with Katy being trapped in the DODs clutches... AND I AM ANXIOUSLY AWAITING A NEW BOOK!

I fell in love with this series, not just because of the hometown nostalgia, but because this book KEEPS you involved. You get so into the rescue missions, the training...just everything! The emotions between Katy and Daemon are unreal and you find yourself yearning for it! I read so many reviews that bashed this series for being a twilight copy cat but... although there are similarities, it is far from Twilight. This book is well worth the late nights you are going to be pulling reading it! :)








ANDDDDDD I did it again...I started reading and also blogging about this when...SHADOWS was the first book in the series. Shadows is based off of Daemon's triplet Dawson and his life. It was weird reading that book after reading the other 3 and thinking...He's not insane and kidnapped... READ SHADOWS FIRST! DON'T BE A Z READER! :\ Only series I have ever read backwards...lol.



Happy Reading!
-Z

The Mortal Instruments/The Infernal Devices

The Mortal Instruments and The Infernal Devices by Cassandra Clare


Ok, so this series was a recommendation from a friend. I was kind of iffy at first because...Come on. Teenage demon hunters? But, I'll read anything and I sure am glad that I gave this series a shot.

It has also been a while since I read these series so as I am typing this, I am skim reading through them again... :) 

You start off following Clary, just a normal girl, with her friend Simon. They wander into a club, Pandemonium, where she sees a guy that just seems a little off. You find out later that (and sorry for the big jump...read the book!) it is Jace..a demon hunter. Clary can see him because she is also a Nephilim. You find out about the mysterious tattoos that cover their bodies, which are actually marks that they create to protect them, make the silent, stronger, etc, etc.
You follow these two as they fight down evil, fall in love, find out their (SPOILER ALERT) brother and sister...and the one man, the most evil man ever, is their father. You continue to follow them as they find out, Jace was adopted and not really Valentine's son...YAY! They can be together again....Andddddd you're left dangling as you await the release of City of Heavenly Fire.

Brief synopsis, but I am just too excited to have to wait for the newest book. I even started reading

The Infernal Devices, which is based on a 1800s version of the shadow hunters in the Mortal Instruments' ancestors (-inhale- boy was the a mouthful). And I have to admit...as much as I loved the Mortal Instruments.. I like The Infernal Devices a whole heck of a lot more. I instantly liked these characters more and fell in love with Will (Jace's Ancestor) and Jem. This series, while also based on the Nephilim; it involves a clockwork army, a curse with inevitable death of a beloved character, a backstabbing brother and...so much more that the Mortal Instruments just doesn't offer. However, I really liked that I read the Mortal Instruments first. You are introduced to so many characters that are in the Infernal Devices that you feel like you know them so much more. Like the colorful Magnus Bane! :) (a wizard that constantly helps the Nephilim and their tireless missions).

All and all both of these series are a great read and you are instantly hooked into them. The characters are something that you can def. relate to and you'll instantly fall in love with them! However, in my mind, I see them all as 20+ years old...I can't imagine them as 16, 17, and 18 years old..I just can't... Their characters are far more mature than they should be but, it also makes an easier read for someone that is older. Not just young adult readers for these ones! :)

I'll add more to this as the new books are released. My feelings and emotions are so torn between both of these series because I just want to know more! What is going to happen with Jace and Clary...What is going to happen to Jem? I just...need to know!



Happy Reading!
-Z