REVIEW: Illuminae (#1) - Jay Kristoff & Amie Kaufman

Illuminae (#1) - Jay Kristoff & Amie Kaufman
Series: The Illuminae Files
Publisher: Oneworld Publications
Format: Paperback
Pages: 608 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★

Goodreads Blurb

This morning, Kady thought breaking up with Ezra was the hardest thing she’d have to do. This afternoon, her planet was invaded.

The year is 2575, and two rival megacorporations are at war over a planet that’s little more than an ice-covered speck at the edge of the universe. Too bad nobody thought to warn the people living on it. With enemy fire raining down on them, Kady and Ezra—who are barely even talking to each other—are forced to fight their way onto an evacuating fleet, with an enemy warship in hot pursuit.

But their problems are just getting started. A deadly plague has broken out and is mutating, with terrifying results; the fleet's AI, which should be protecting them, may actually be their enemy; and nobody in charge will say what’s really going on. As Kady hacks into a tangled web of data to find the truth, it's clear only one person can help her bring it all to light: the ex-boyfriend she swore she'd never speak to again.

REVIEW: Bonfire - Krysten Ritter*

Bonfire - Krysten Ritter*
Publisher: Cornerstone
Format:  E-Book
Pages: 288 Pages
Rating: ★★★★

*Received from NetGalley for an honest review*

Goodreads Blurb

It has been ten years since Abby Williams left home and scrubbed away all visible evidence of her small town roots. Now working as an environmental lawyer in Chicago, she has a thriving career, a modern apartment, and her pick of meaningless one-night stands.

But when a new case takes her back home to Barrens, Indiana, the life Abby painstakingly created begins to crack. Tasked with investigating Optimal Plastics, the town's most high-profile company and economic heart, Abby begins to find strange connections to Barrens’ biggest scandal from more than a decade ago involving the popular Kaycee Mitchell and her closest friends—just before Kaycee disappeared for good.

Abby knows the key to solving any case lies in the weak spots, the unanswered questions. But as Abby tries to find out what really happened to Kaycee, she unearths an even more disturbing secret—a ritual called “The Game,” which will threaten the reputations, and lives, of the community and risk exposing a darkness that may consume her.

REVIEW: Tap (#1) - Georgia Cates

Tap (#1) - Georgia Cates
Series: Lovibond
Publisher: Georgia Cates Books
Format: Kindle
Pages: 294 Pages
Rating: ★★★★

Goodreads Blurb

A faceless name. That’s all she was when I agreed to play a part in deceiving her. But then the unplanned happened.

We met. And all I wanted from her was a dirty weekend . . . until that wasn’t enough and I longed for so much more.

Lawrence Thorn suddenly means the world to me. And that’s a problem. She’s my business partner’s sister. Forbidden fruit. Pursuing her can mean trouble for me at Lovibond Brewery. But I don’t care.

I yearn for her skin against mine.
I crave her smell on my body.
I want to make her laugh and then hear her moan my name.
And she does for a brief moment in time.

But Lawrence wants more than I’m able to give. And it’s a damn shame because there’s no one on earth I want more than her.

REVIEW: Wolf by Wolf (#1) - Ryan Graudin

Wolf by Wolf (#1) - Ryan Graudin
Series: Wolf by Wolf
Publisher: Hachette Children's Group
Format: Paperback
Pages: 400 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★

Goodreads Blurb

The year is 1956, and the Axis powers of the Third Reich and Imperial Japan rule. To commemorate their Great Victory, Hitler and Emperor Hirohito host the Axis Tour: an annual motorcycle race across their conjoined continents. The victor is awarded an audience with the highly reclusive Adolf Hitler at the Victor’s Ball in Tokyo.

Yael, a former death camp prisoner, has witnessed too much suffering, and the five wolves tattooed on her arm are a constant reminder of the loved ones she lost. The resistance has given Yael one goal: Win the race and kill Hitler. A survivor of painful human experimentation, Yael has the power to skinshift and must complete her mission by impersonating last year’s only female racer, Adele Wolfe. This deception becomes more difficult when Felix, Adele twin’s brother, and Luka, her former love interest, enter the race and watch Yael’s every move.

But as Yael grows closer to the other competitors, can she bring herself to be as ruthless as she needs to be to avoid discovery and complete her mission?

REVIEW: Passenger (#1) - Alexandra Bracken

Passenger (#1) - Alexandra Bracken
Series: Passenger
Publisher: Hachette Children's Group
Format: Paperback
Pages: 496 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★

Goodreads Blurb

In one devastating night, violin prodigy Etta Spencer loses everything she knows and loves. Thrust into an unfamiliar world by a stranger with a dangerous agenda, Etta is certain of only one thing: she has traveled not just miles but years from home. And she’s inherited a legacy she knows nothing about from a family whose existence she’s never heard of. Until now.

Nicholas Carter is content with his life at sea, free from the Ironwoods—a powerful family in the colonies—and the servitude he’s known at their hands. But with the arrival of an unusual passenger on his ship comes the insistent pull of the past that he can’t escape and the family that won’t let him go so easily. Now the Ironwoods are searching for a stolen object of untold value, one they believe only Etta, Nicholas’ passenger, can find. In order to protect her, he must ensure she brings it back to them—whether she wants to or not.

Together, Etta and Nicholas embark on a perilous journey across centuries and continents, piecing together clues left behind by the traveler who will do anything to keep the object out of the Ironwoods’ grasp. But as they get closer to the truth of their search, and the deadly game the Ironwoods are playing, treacherous forces threaten to separate Etta not only from Nicholas but from her path home... forever.

REVIEW: Gnomon - Nick Harkaway*

Gnomon - Nick Harkaway*
Publisher:  Cornerstone
Format: E-Book
Pages: 704 Pages
Rating: DNF

*Received from NetGalley for an honest review*

Goodreads Blurb

Gnomon, which took Harkaway more than three years to complete, is set in a world of ubiquitous surveillance. Pitched as "a mind-bending Borgesian puzzle box of identity, meaning and reality in which the solution steps sideways as you approach it", it features: a detective who finds herself investigating the very society she believes in, urged on by a suspect who may be an assassin or an ally, hunting through the dreams of a torture victim in search of the key to something she does not yet understand; a banker who is pursued by a shark that swallows Fortune 500 companies; Saint Augustine’s jilted mistress who reshapes the world with miracles; a refugee grandfather turned games designer who must remember how to walk through walls or be burned alive by fascists; and a sociopath who falls backwards through time in order to commit a murder.

REVIEW: The New Dark (#1) - Lorraine Thomson*

The New Dark (#1) - Lorraine Thomson*
Series: The Dark Times
Publisher: Bastei Entertainment
Format: E-Book
Pages: 221 Pages
Rating: ★★★

*Received from NetGalley for an honest review*

Goodreads Blurb

There is no "Before", there is only "Now". Because now there’s no internet, no TV, no power grid. Food is scarce, and the world’s a hostile place. But Sorrel lives a quiet life in the tiny settlement of Amat. It’s all she’s ever known ...

Until a gang of marauding mutants destroys the village, snatching her brother Eli, and David, her boyfriend. Sorrel sets out after them, embarking on a journey fraught with danger. Can she survive? The only thing that keeps her going is Eli and David. They are out there somewhere. They must be alive. And if she has her way, she will find them.